Masterpiece Congress: Aaron Schock's Office Is A Hoot

I mean, really, I know I'm supposed to be outraged that a decorator was hired in what may be a contravention of the ethics laws (Common Cause), or that Congressman Aaron (Six Pack) Schock decorated his office in a motif inspired by a PBS program after voting to defund the network (Think Progress). I am trying to be a good liberal here but...

WHAT THE HELL?

Bright red walls. A gold-colored wall sconce with black candles. A Federal-style bull's-eye mirror with an eagle perched on top. And this is just the Illinois Republican's outer office. "It's actually based off of the red room in 'Downton Abbey,' " said the woman behind the front desk, comparing it to the luxurious set piece at the heart of the British period drama. This was a bold room. But the confidence was a mirage. For on Capitol Hill, caution is king when it comes to the micromanagement of one's image, even in the case of how a congressman decides to decorate his office.

(Full Disclosure: I never have watched a second of Downton Abbey because my family's tolerance for sentimental Anglophiliac period pieces ended at about the same time the Easter Rising did. That said, I have been a Maggie Smith fan ever since I first saw her as Miss Brooooooodie ("I am in the business of putting old heads on your shoulders and all of my girls are the creme de la creme") so I'm glad she has a gig.)

Of course, we weren't really supposed to know any of this. Enter a very frazzled press aide.

It was Schock's communications director, Benjamin Cole. "Are you taking pictures of the office?" he asked. "Who told you you could do that? . . . Okay, stay where you are. You've created a bit of a crisis in the office." A staff member then came and asked me to please delete the photos from my phone. So started a day of back-and-forths with a congressman's office about interior design...An office decorated in a unique way would hardly be surprising; it would just be another interesting fact about a congressman who has built a brand as not just another politician. So why was this a crisis? "You've got a member [of Congress] willing to talk to you about other things," Cole said on the phone. "Why sour it by rushing to write some gossipy piece?"

Aaaaaaannnnnnd, scene!

Did you know they could do this? I didn't know they could do this. I knew they could hang stuff on the wall and everything, and Ted Kennedy used to have an inner office so chock-full of Kennedyiana that nobody ever came out voting against the senator. But this is a whole different thing. Could a congresscritter decorate his office as the Fortress Of Solitude, or the race and sports book at Caesar's, or the Winnipeg Jets locker room, as long as the c-critter in question obeyed the congressional ethics regulations regarding gifts and so on? (Somebody could do up an office as an 1870's New Orleans bordello, but that would be redundant.) The things you learn on this job, I'll tell you.

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